The Taliesin Preservation Commission works to preserve Taliesin - Frank Lloyd Wright's Wisconsin estate in Spring Green, Wisconsin - while educating the public about the importance of Taliesin and Wright. The Commission is a private, not-for-profit organization whose future depends on private donations and grants. Creating a presence for the Commission on the Internet will allow the organization to substantially achieve its goals by increasing awareness and education while heightening funding opportunities. This project created a website for the Taliesin Preservation Commission. The effort involved background research into the Internet, its capabilities, the Commission, and their needs. While this information supported the development of the project, the project focused on the web authoring. The primary activities included site content development, site organization, research, writing of text, graphic development, page design, and HTML code writing. In addition, the project secured website storage space and dial-up access for the Commission. It concluded with the launching of the Taliesin Preservation Commission's website at www.taliesinpreservation.org. / Department of Architecture

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Wollongong, 2003. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references: leaf 225-248.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 1998. / Running title: CHD Web site. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Western Sydney, 2008. / A thesis submitted to the University of Western Sydney, College of Health and Science, School of Computing and Mathematics, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (MIT(Informatics))--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Abstract in English and Afrikaans. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 1998. / Running title: CHD Web site. Includes bibliographical references.

O desenvolvimento de sistemas com eficácia, eficiência e satisfação dos usuários tem feito com que a usabilidade se torne uma característica importante na avaliação de qualidade de um produto de software. A análise da interação do usuário com o sistema é uma das formas de mensurar essa característica. Novas tecnologias permitem a criação de sistemas com foco na qualidade de interação do usuário, com grande parte do processamento ocorrendo no lado cliente, como as Aplicações Internet Ricas ou simplesmente RIAs, de Rich Internet Applications. No entanto, os dados de interação do usuário armazenados no servidor web são insuficientes para extrair conhecimento útil sobre a qualidade da interação. Este trabalho apresenta uma abordagem para avaliação automática de usabilidade através da aplicação de clustering e métricas na análise de log de RIAs. A abordagem proposta utiliza a Web Application Usage Tracking Tool, WAUTT, para capturar a interação do usuário e o algoritmo X-Means para realizar o agrupamento dos dados. O resultado da avaliação automática emprega métricas que fornecem informação quantitativa a respeito da usabilidade de sistemas web e que poderão ser utilizadas pelo avaliador para auxiliar na tomada de decisão. As informações obtidas com as métricas foram comparadas a um método de avaliação tradicional, a avaliação heurística, para corroborar os resultados obtidos pela abordagem proposta. O clustering foi uma técnica útil para reduzir o volume de dados e permitira ao avaliador concentrar os seus esforços em determinados grupos de usuários com comportamentos semelhantes. A aplicação de métricas aos clusters permitiu realizar uma avaliação de usabilidade quantitativa para auxiliar a tomada de decisão em relação a algumas das subcaracterísticas de usabilidade. A avaliação automática de usabilidade realizada tem potencial para auxiliar no desenvolvimento de sistemas web. / The development of systems with effectiveness, efficiency and user satisfaction has made that usability become an important feature in quality assessment of software products. The analysis of user interaction data with the system is one way to measure this feature. New technologies allow the creation of systems with focus on quality of user interaction and a large part of the processing occurs on the client side, as Rich Internet Applications, from RIAs for short. However, user interaction data stored on the webserver are insufficient to extract useful knowledge about the quality of interaction. This dissertation presents an approach for automatic usability evaluation by applying clustering and metrics in log analysis of RIAs. The proposed approach uses the Web Application Usage Tracking Tool, WAUTT, to capture user interaction and the X-means algorithm to perform clustering. The result of the automatic evaluation applies metrics that provide quantitative information about the usability of web systems and may be used to assist evaluators in making decisions. Information obtained from metrics were compared to a traditional evaluation method, heuristic evaluation, to corroborate the results obtained by the proposed approach. Clustering was a useful technique to reduce the volume of data and allowed the evaluator focus their efforts on certain groups of users with similar behaviors. The application of metrics enabled perform a quantitative usability evaluation to assist the decision making process about some usability subcharacteristics. The automatic usability evaluation conducted as the proposed approach has the potential to assist in developing web systems.

Please read the abstract in the section 00front of this document A CD containing, A Program in Interior Design, accompanies the paper copy of this dissertation. It can be consulted in the Unit for Special Collections in the Merensky Library on the main campus of the University of Pretoria / Dissertation (MA (Information Science))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Information Science / unrestricted

Web portals are considered “gateways” to the World Wide Web. These portals are becoming very popular entry points to the Web by offering important services such as email, news, weather reports, course notes and general information. In addition, some portal sites allow users the option of customising the site according to their personal interests. However, disabled and elderly people encounter many accessibility and usability barriers while accessing web portals. A preliminary review of a university portal was conducted to identify some of these accessibility problems. This treatise presents an overview of the processes to be followed when conducting an accessibility and usability evaluation. In addition, it mentions some guidelines to be considered when specifically designing portals for use by many different users from varying backgrounds.

The number of citizens, who access e-Government websites, is growing significantly and their expectations for additional services are increasing. The Internet has become an essential instrument to distribute information to citizens. Poorly designed websites, however, can divide governments and its citizens. Consensus amongst researchers is that user experience (UX) is an important factor in designing websites specifically e-Government websites. Problems, experienced with website usability, prevent people from accessing and eventually adopting technology, such as e-Government. Countries, such as the United States, United Kingdom and Canada, have shown increased support for UX in e-Government websites. At present, a number of guidelines and design principles exists for e-Government website UX design; however, the effectiveness of the implementation of these guidelines and principles depends on the profiles of the individuals on a website development team and on an organisation’s understanding of UX. Despite the highlighted importance of UX, guidelines and principles are rarely adopted in South African e-Government websites. Usability and UX guidelines cannot be implemented; if there is no executive support; an inadequately trained staff; no routine UX practice; insufficient budget; inefficient use of usability methodologies and user-centred design (UCD) processes. The challenge at present in the UX design field is the institutionalisation of UX, specifically at government level. The goal of this research was to propose and evaluate a methodology to institutionalise UX in South African Provincial Governments (PGs), named the “Institutionalise UX in Government (IUXG) methodology”. The research used the Western Cape Government (WCG) in South Africa as a case study to evaluate the proposed methodology to institutionalise UX in a South African PG. The IUXG methodology (1.0) was proposed from five UX methodologies, as well as from best practices found in literature. The IUXG methodology (1.1) was updated, based on results of a survey to South African PGs, a survey to WCG employees, as well as literature from the WCG. The IUXG methodology (2.0) was updated a final time, based on the case study results and on a confirmation survey with WCG employees after the implementation of the case study. The research study made use of three surveys during this research. The first survey, incorporating UX maturity models, confirmed that understanding and buy-in of UX are limited and that UX maturity levels are low at South African PG level. The second and third surveys were administered to WCG e-Government website officials before and after the implementation of the IUXG methodology. The surveys measured the UX maturity level of the WCG in the component, e-Government for Citizens (e-G4C), responsible for the WCG e-Government website. The final survey results demonstrated that, after the implementation of the IUXG methodology, the WCG improved its level of UX maturity on the identified UX maturity models. Implementation of the IUXG methodology institutionalised UX in the WCG. UX activities became standard practice in the e-Government website environment after the systems development lifecycle (SDLC) incorporated UCD. UX policy, strategy and guidelines were documented for the WCG e-Government website. The WCG constructed the first usability testing facility for a South African PG and improvements to the WCG e-Government website were implemented. The proposed IUXG methodology institutionalised UX in the WCG e-Government website environment. This research is a major contribution, to addressing the current lack of UX practices in South African PGs. South African PGs can use the proposed IUXG methodology to institutionalise UX and it will assist PG officials to develop increased UX maturity levels. The advantage of the IUXG methodology is that it provides PG officials with a step-by-step method how to institutionalise UX in a PG by following the six phases of the IUXG methodology: startup, setup, organisation, method, standards and long-term. The IUXG methodology will assist South African PGs to establish UX practice as a norm. The IUXG methodology will assist PGs with the resources, methods and tools to enable them to implement UX guidelines, which will result in an improved, more usable and more user-centric PG e-Government website.